“It’s always helpful to understand that staying at a five-star hotel in Europe is quite a different experience than staying at one in Asia, or even in America for that matter. You’ll never get the service of the Oriental in Bangkok or the amenities of the St. Regis in New York. But what you do get is a heavy dose of old-world charm. And yes, sometimes that does come in the form of a beautiful hand-loomed carpet that is a bit stained or a breakfast buffet with indifferent food. That is what I love about hotels like the Ritz. You have to take a portfolio view of the experience and not focus too hard on any one aspect. Is that your experience?”

“Yes, it is.”

“Then invite me up to your room sometime.”

“Not a chance,” she said with a laugh. “So far I’ve focused on the fresh fruit that arrives each day. Today it was yellow plums. Yesterday it was Haifa oranges.”

“Don’t tell your taxpayers,” he said.

“Sometimes being a government slave has its perks. This is one, I guess. And what the heck, I’m a prima donna, anyway, and tend to injure easily.”

He laughed again. “Of that I have no doubt,” he said. “Unfortunately, I come from a small backward country with an outstanding football team but a third-world economy.”

“Oh, knock it off.” They both moved toward the door. “You make Italy sound like Tunisia.”

“Sometimes the similarity is vague,” he said.

By then it had become a conversation in motion, Essen of Interpol tightly latching a computer case and talking to Fitzgerald of Scotland Yard in hushed tones, while LeMaitre, the Frenchman, picked through his pockets for a pack of cigarettes.

The two Spaniards in uniform stood at their places and waited in case anyone felt like asking them anything further. They looked disappointed when no one did.

Floyd Connelly of US Customs came over. His face was puffy up close, little red veins visible around the eyes that suggested a more than passing acquaintance with booze over several decades. He had the confused look of a man playing out the final few months before retirement, not really on top of anything any more, and torn between saying something smart and making a fool of himself.

“A lot of bull, this whole thing,” he said in English. “I don’t know why I was even included here.”

“I don’t either,” Rizzo said.

“I had to fly in for this,” he muttered. “I missed a golf weekend in Maryland and an Orioles-Yankees game. I thought the peet-a was a big rock in Rome, and now this guy’s telling us it’s a little thing that got stolen from here.”

“This is one of the tinier ones,” Rizzo said, switching smoothly to English. “Which is why it walked off.”

“How you supposed to keep track of them if there’s two things by the same name?” Connelly asked.

Rizzo blinked. “There are actually several,” Rizzo added. He and Alex looked at him in the same way, wondering if he was that dumb or joking.

“Well, carry on,” Connelly said, ignoring Rizzo and looking at Alex. “If you need anything, give me a holler.” He handed her a business card. On it he had written the name of his hotel in Madrid and a phone number.

“I’ll do that. Same going the other direction,” she said.

“Yeah. Right,” he answered, after taking a moment to figure out what she meant. “Right. Listen, my Spanish is a little weak, so I might give you a call just to compare notes on what was said here.”

“That’s fine,” Alex said. “But the handouts are in English also.”

“Are they?”

“But call me with any questions,” she said.

“Right,” he said again. “Okay.”

Rizzo and Alex watched him lumber to the door and leave. Rizzo placed a hand on her shoulder, then took it away.

“Political appointee,” she said.

“Capisco,” he said.

“Anyway, you look like you’re doing well,” he said, going back to English. “I’m very glad. You were in my thoughts for the last weeks.”

“Thank you.”

“This work can slowly kill you sometimes,” he said. “Sometimes I wake up and am surprised I’m still alive. Know what I mean?”

“Look,” she said. “The Ritz is only a few blocks from here and they have an excellent café just off the lobby. I think you should buy me coffee.”

“I think I should too,” he said.

MADRID, SEPTEMBER 7, EARLY AFTERNOON

On the outskirts of Madrid, Mahoud’s small car pulled to a halt in front of a ramshackle garage connected to a private home. The neighborhood was one of immigrants from Asia and North Africa. The home was owned by a taxi driver named Basheer. Basheer was not home at the time. He was an honest workingman in his thirties who pushed an old vehicle around Madrid for twelve hours a day, six days a week, to support his family. He had emigrated from a war-torn Lebanon to Spain in 1993. His family had found peace and prosperity in Western Europe.

Basheer was also the second member of the cell that Jean-Claude had pulled together in Madrid.

Jean-Claude stepped out and, as he always did, surveyed the street. His eyes swept quickly. He saw no danger. From a ring of keys, he found the one to Basheer’s garage. He unlocked the two doors and swung them open. He glanced at his watch.

Mahoud pulled the car into the garage. They closed the garage door and waited.

In the garage, which had space for only one car, Jean-Claude flipped open a cell phone and called a certain number. A familiar voice answered in Spanish.

“Soy aqui,” Jean-Claude said.

The response was rapid. “Veinti minutes.” Twenty minutes. But, Basheer warned, he had just dropped off some lousy American businesspeople at the airport and the traffic might be bad returning. Or he might catch a fare that he didn’t want to turn down.

Jean-Claude said he would wait and clicked off.

For a moment, neither Mahoud nor Jean-Claude spoke. There was taped music from Egypt on the car radio. It played softly. The garage was stuffy and hot, the sun pounding on the roof. Jean-Claude smoked. Mahoud coughed.

He switched back to Arabic. “Why don’t you go stand sentry?” Jean-Claude suggested. “Outside. Stand across the street and keep watch.”

“I don’t want to,” Mahoud said.

“I didn’t ask if you wanted to,” Jean-Claude answered.

Mahoud glared and hesitated. Then he opened his door, got out, and slammed it shut. He leaned forward and glared at Jean-Claude, looking as if he had something to say. He had a gun at his belt, beneath a soccer jersey. But Jean-Claude returned the glare with cold brown eyes. Mahoud exited the garage through the side door and took up his assigned position across the street.

Jean-Claude remained in the back of the old car, his duffel bags at arm’s reach. There was also a rear exit to this garage, one that led to an alley that led between buildings and to safety down another street. If he felt that they had drawn a tail, this was his escape route before his cargo reached its destination. But for now everything looked fine.

His attention drifted to a side door that led from the garage into a kitchen. The door was half open. There was activity in the kitchen now. Basheer’s wife, Leila, was there with her young child.

Leila was a trim Arab woman, very pretty with fair skin. She was very young, maybe eighteen or nineteen. She was dressed very immodestly because of the heat.

Jean-Claude watched her, his eyes riveted, more than a devout man should. Basheer, the taxi driver, was obviously a fortunate man in his home, not only to have such a young wife but such a sensual one too.

The child was a boy. Excellent. Basheer and his wife had been blessed with a son. If Jean-Claude ever had a family, he would want a woman who looked as good as Basheer’s wife and he would want to impregnate her with many sons to continue his wars. Basheer’s wife had the infant in a high chair and was fixing a meal for her offspring. She was a perfect baby machine, a nice lithe body and obviously fertile.